Glass mazes aren't so fun
by Zomnombie
Summary: AU. After the death of his wife, a desparing Franky and his family are shown around the eccentric estate of his recently deceased uncle. Little do they know a horrific stratagem has finally begun.
1. Chapter 1: Not chapter 1 just quite yet

**Note:(feel free to skip) Um, so... Yeah, hi, first time writing a fanfic. This is based on 13 ghosts (the start especially) which is an AM-AY-ZING film though if you haven't seen it then it doesn't really effect the reading experience so don't worry about it. Also no real parings in this except for kind-of-ish Frobin later on. Also also this first part is just a little prologue before the story really begins.**

**Disclamer: Not mine :(**

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Prologue

Ragged yellow police tape fluttered in the breeze as a large tanker crashed through the junkyard gates followed by a small entourage of black vans. As the vans came to a halt, men wearing plastic overcoats climbed out and started to set up various technical equipment. An old-fashioned car pulled up behind them and a very tall, important looking man with spiked puple-red hair who was wearing a black coat and orange pants climbed out followed by a man with long blue hair, a red nose and an orange coat who was clutching his head in pain. He fell to the floor as the red-head spoke with a malicious grin,

"Is it bad tonight?"

"Bad?" the bluenette replied, "that's one way to describe it. Insane seems more appropriate. It feels like he's breathing down my neck... In my professional opinion: we should get the hell outta here, Moriah! Now!"

"Well, in that case, your professional opinion isn't wanted!" the other man hissed before turning away and ordering the technicians to hurry up.

Turning back and grabbing the bluenette by the back of his coat, Moriah pulled him to the front of the car,

"first things first, where is he?" he asked impatiently

"err..."

"Show me where he's hiding!" he demanded, taking out a black and white overhead photo of the junkyard and tapping it impatiently. The other could only sigh and hesitantly pressed his palm onto the ground.

Immediately red visions of monsters and screaming victims flashed before his eyes. He quickly pulled his hand away with a cry of pain and looked accusingly at the tall man,

"You bastard! You said he only killed nine people! There's over forty victims here!" he shouted. Moriah only looked irritated,

"Nine while he was alive, he's added a few more since then; now, where is he, Buggy?" he snapped. Buggy narrowed his eyes and wordlessly pointed ahead of them just as something flitted between the crushed cars. Moriah stood up straight and ordered his men to bring in "the cube".

On queue a crane hoisted up a clear glass cubical with ancient text carved into it from one of the trucks and slowly lowered it to the ground. Moriah started to walk over to the group of tech guys, Buggy hot on his heels,

"So why was he called "the sandman"? Did he dig holes?" he asked as he tried to keep up,

"Just folklore." was all Moriah offered as an explanation. Rather than question any further, the shorter man just decided to frown as he continued to follow.

Suddenly a scrap car fell down directly in front of the pair, causing Buggy to jump back with a surprised shout,

"this bastard isn't like the others!" he warned, shaken, but Moriah only shrugged it off.

Some angry shouts came from behind them and they turned around to see a group of technicians dragging over a man with a shaven head and struggling woman with dark green eyes.

"How can you possibly justify what you're doing, Moriah?" the man said in a deep, angry tone, "it's slavery!"

Moriah only grinned, showing off a mouth full of pointed teeth,

"You sure are persistent, I'll give you that, Daz Bones" he said before turning to the thin woman "And hello to you too, Paula. Still carrying around your pathetic quicksilver flares and your little magic book?"

"You can't do this! You aren't capturing animals! These are humans we're talking about!" she shouted angrily, spitting at his feet, the wind ruffling her frizzy blue hair,

"DEAD humans," Buggy pointed out "they can't feel anything, no pain, no emotions. Why don't you just go and join green peace or throw blood on old ladies' fur coats? We have important business here!"

After shooting him a icy glare, Paula angrily turned to Moriah who was snickering,

"Bastard! Who are you to play god!?"

"Playing is for children; I'm going to BE god,"

"You'll never pull it off! Not

without the right spells! That and the thirteenth ghost!"

"Thirteenth ghost?" asked Buggy

"Get them out of my sight, we're wasting time," Moriah said lazily, ignoring him completely.

The pair were dragged off and tied to an old car wreck as a technician shouted over to let them know that everything was ready,

"Turn on the transmitters!" Moriah shouted back as he put on some odd looking, red rimmed glasses before starting to climb up onto a pile of rusted cars for a better view.

"Bring in the bait," he said through a microphone on his coat once he had made himself comfortable on the sturdy stack of metal. As soon as he had given the command a silver tanker rolled into view,

"BAIT!?" shouted Buggy from below "We've never used bait before! Why now!?"

"Because I can't afford to lose this one!" Moriah snapped back.

Buggy's jaw dropped as ruby red blood started to gush from pipes attached to the tanker, covering the glass cube and the surrounding cars.

"Power it up!" Moriah shouted into the mic. Not caring that the majority of the team was still in the blood soaked area. The doors on the cube shot open and a foreign chant was broadcasted through some speakers.

An angry howl shook the whole yard. It was getting closer and closer and Buggy could only watch with a horrified expression as a cloud of sand seemed to appear, a wall of cars toppled over and a man was tossed into the air by some unseen force.

Then everyone started to panic.

As the team ran from the invisible monster, one man tried to climb up a pile of cars but as he got to the top he was pulled violently into a car bonnet, his spine snapping with an audible crack. More cars were thrown into the air, some hitting people and some narrowly missing them as sand whirled around the yard and they slipped on the bloody floor. One of the escaping technicians looked back as she ran and watched as the sand briefly accumulated into the tall figure of a man before she slammed into one of the inside walls of the glass cube. Before the poor woman knew what was going on, the sand figure had followed her into the cube. The few surviving people stared in mortification as the cube automatically sealed up and she was promptly torn apart, her blood splattering on the walls. Buggy ran up to the glass and got a proper look at the ghost: he had slicked back raven hair and a noticeable scar running horizontally across his face. However, his most striking feature was one of his hands - or lack thereof - as it had been replaced with a large solid-gold hook.

As the bluenette brought his face closer to see more clearly, "the sandman" smashed his mammoth hook into the glass, trying to escape. Buggy jumped back with a yelp and landed in the mud, letting out a sigh of relief when he remembered the spells carved into the walls of the cube would prevent the vengeful spirit from escaping. He decided to take his glasses off since without them the spirit would be invisible to him and he really didn't want to have to look at the burning (and absolutely pants-wettingly terrifying) glare that was directed towards him. At least there weren't anymore ghosts to capture.

As he became more aware of the scene around him, Paula's frantic screams seemed to suddenly fill the air. She was crouched over the bloody dead body of her partner and friend, Daz Bones, crying and cursing Moriah to the depths of hell.

'That's right, where's Moriah?' Buggy thought, glancing round as he started to look for the redhead.

He eventually found Moriah's body on the floor with a big, bloody shard of scrap metal sticking through his pale neck.


	2. Chapter 2

It was a sunny day, there wasn't a cloud in the sky, the flowers were blossoming and the birds were singing.

"Today on pirates in East Blue: walking the plank is still voted no.1!" chirped a small boy with messy black hair and a scar under his eye into an old-looking voice recorder. "And this morning we have a special treat for everyone - a body was found this morning decapilated- decr- decaper-"

"De-ca-pi-ta-ted," Corrected a young man with a long nose and curly hair who sat down next to him with a laugh and poured orange juice into some glasses.

A girl in her older teens with orange hair and brown eyes stood at the stove frying some eggs which were starting to turn black.

"Luffy, you need to get a better hobby," she said looking irritated, "pirates are so childish!" The boy just pouted and turned his recorder off just as a man with blue hair who was wearing little more than an open Hawaiian shirt and some speedos walked into the kitchen,

"Mornin', everyone!" he said cheerfully, wandering over to the table,

"Dad! Dad! They found a guy without a head in a dumpster behind The Baratie!" Luffy shouted excitedly, jumping up and down.

"The Baratie? Sanji must've finally lost it!" he joked, ruffling the boy's hair with a laugh before pouring himself some cola from the fridge.

While taking a large a gulp of his drink he walked over to the girl on the other side of the room who had forgotten about the blackening eggs and was counting some money on the worktop.

"Nami, why don't you let Usopp make breakfast? That's why I hired him," he said as he took the pan and walked carefully over to the bin.

"Dad, have you tried his cooking?" she said with a smirk

"Hey, I heard that!" the long-nosed boy shouted indignantly.

Feeling left out, Luffy piped up,

"Da-ad!" he shouted "tell Nami that pirates are cooool!"

"Nami, there's nothing wrong with pirates," He said distractedly while trying to scrape charred egg from the pan into the bin.

"She's being a real bastard about it," Luffy grumbled,

"Luffy, don't call your sister a bastard," Usopp chided with a grin "I think heartless, money-obsessed witch would be a more fitting name... Hey, have I told you the story of how I found myself trapped for five years in a witch's lair? Well, first-"

"Luffy, have you been practicing your kendo?" Franky asked, giving up on the eggs and walking over to the cupboards to look for some poptarts.

" told me-"

He tripped over Nami's waver, which made him spill his remaining cola all over himself,

"Dammit! This is the tenth time I've tripped over this thing this week! Will somebody get this off the floor before it kills someone!" he shouted, looking uncharacteristically stressed as he grabbed a cloth from the sink and tried to wipe the sticky drink off his chest and shirt. At that moment the door bell buzzed loudly causing everyone to stop what they were doing and look towards it,

"Urgh... The lawyer. I forgot he was coming; how un-super,"

"Lawyer? What lawyer? I thought that was all cleared up." Nami hissed, looking at him angrily.

"it's alright, it's not about that," he assured

"were not gonna move again, are we?" Luffy asked, absentmindedly

"no, don't worry, everything's fine!"


End file.
